1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to data transfer techniques and in particular to a data transfer method and system allowing improved data transfer speed without increasing the number of signal lines.
2. Description of the Related Art
In an apparatus that is required to have light weight and a small size, it is desirable to decrease the number of terminals of a large-scale integrated circuit (LSI), from the viewpoint of installation. For this purpose, a serial data interface has been used to transfer data between two LSIs. One-bit data transfer per one system clock is a maximum data transfer speed at the serial data interface.
In the case of transferring eight-bit data of D0 to D7 as shown in FIG. 8A from a sending LSI to a receiving LSI by using a serial data interface, for example, three signal lines are necessary in total including a data line, a serial clock line for transferring a serial clock signal shown in FIG. 8B, and a strobe signal line for a strobe signal shown in FIG. 8C. In this case, it is necessary to take time required for outputting eight serial clock pulses and the strobe signal. This has a problem in that the data transfer speed is slow.